Fat Chance – GlenAllachie 12 Years

Finally, a Scotch drink that keeps my tradition of mixing Manhattan variations. In this case, the base spirit comes in the from of the GlenAllachie 12 Years. Let’s just say that for this recipe I combined it with a few compatible ingredients.

Since the famous Billy Walker took over GlenAllachie, the distillery gained new momentum. I already wrote about a tasting of their whiskies in 2023. So, the 12-Year-Old was familiar. Yet, the whisky got a new label in the meantime. For the whisky, GlenAllachie combines PX, Oloroso and new oak cask single malt. The final bottling has an ABV of 46 % without any addition of clouring or chill-filtration.

A lot of sherry

I actually, tasted the GlenAllachie twice, because I had forgotten about the first one. Yet, my notes and conclusion were almost the same. You definitely get a lot if sherry fruits, with dominant red and black berries. There also is a certain plum pudding quality to it with just a hint of charcoal (maybe from the new barrels?). In the end, the 12-Year-Old is a very tasty sherry forward whisky!

More of a Chancellor variation

Yes, I wrote that this drink is a Manhattan variation above. However, when I come to think of it, the resulting recipe reminds me more of a Chancellor cocktail. Either way, I used reserve port wine as the fortifier. On top of that, I split the base with some cacao eau de vie. Last but not least, I added some bitters and a splash of simple syrup to balance out the drink.

Even though this is a spirit forward drink, the overall result is quite smooth. I guess this is due to the great combination of sherry cask single malt, cacao eau de vie and port. Interestingly enough, the cacao eau de vie does not overwhelm the drink at all. Apart from that, the combination of bitters gives the cocktail an extra dimension of flavour.

*The fact that I received a product reviewed in this article for free, did not – in any way – influence the rating of said product. The single malt was provided by Kirsch Whisky.